


in my head (I do everything right)

by Directionless_Foray



Series: bad baby [8]
Category: Formula 1 RPF
Genre: Complicated Relationships, Flashbacks, M/M, Marriage, the kiddies are here too
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-02
Updated: 2020-05-02
Packaged: 2021-02-26 19:29:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,727
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23973394
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Directionless_Foray/pseuds/Directionless_Foray
Summary: Seb turns around at that moment and locks eyes with Charles in the hallway.He smiles affectionate and content and it's too much.(Too much dream or cruel taunt.)There's a gallery of voices inside his head and they're mocking him.(Look how much you lost.)(Look how much you lose every morning.)(Just by daring to wake up again.)Charles bolts.Runs out into the garden, barefoot and trailing multicoloured silk.
Relationships: Charles Leclerc/Sebastian Vettel
Series: bad baby [8]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1699429
Comments: 29
Kudos: 59





	in my head (I do everything right)

**Author's Note:**

> oh my god firstly i am sorry
> 
> this came out of nowhere. 
> 
> I'm meant to be working on an assignment and i spent whatever time working on my assignment thinking about this and whatever time i spent on this thinking about that assignment. Rip
> 
> Title from ‘Supercut’ by Lorde
> 
> for reference, this is structured in flashbacks and a current timeline. the flashbacks are NOT in chronological order (as will become evident). this is also feasibly set a few years after the last instalment, i really winged it with the ages so feel free to assume it's anywhere from 5-10 years later
> 
> idk if anyone is reading this without reading the rest of the bad baby verse but like- read the rest first lol

_(Now)_

Seb enters the Monaldi hospital in Naples at eleven pm two days after his fifty-second birthday party.

The company and security commandeer the entire East Wing and waiting room in a matter of minutes.

There are ten nondescript black cars parked in the hospital car park and a cherry-red Ferrari right by the doors to the Emergency Department.

Collette was headed to Amalfi for a trip with some friends from school but Charles has called someone to send a car to bring her straight to the hospital.

Leon is sitting quietly next to Charles doing his math homework with an HB pencil and a red racing car eraser. 

Henry is standing nervously next to a vending machine, still in his ratty pyjama pants and an old athletics t-shirt. He sat with Charles and held his hand in the ambulance on the way to the hospital.

He keeps bouncing his left leg. 

Kimi is sitting on Charles' other side on one of the uncomfortable plastic waiting room chairs too.

His skin feels cold and he hasn't said a single word since he barked the orders to bring Collette back home from Amalfi.

He sits in his silk kimono and a pair of hastily swiped flannel pyjama bottoms that belong to Seb, clasps his trembling hands together and _prays_.

_(Then)_

Charles wakes up in an empty bed in a beautiful palazzo in Sorrento and starts hyperventilating.

The sheets are cold.

His bed is _empty. _

In his dreams, a handsome man with blue eyes, calloused hands, and a scar stretching from his ear lobe to his chin is kissing his hair and tangling their legs together.

He's making promises about _tomorrow_ but never _forever._

The sunlight flooding into the room is evidence of the _tomorrow _but there is no trace of the man.

The man who made the promises.

Charles feels the tears gathering as he scrabbles to throw away the covers and run downstairs.

It was a dream.

It was all a dream.

It was a _dream_.

He stops dead in the hallway when he hears the laughter and chattering. The tell-tale clinking of cutlery and utensils.

Seb is stood in the kitchen with the kids.

_Making pancakes_.

The sunlight is turning his curly mop of hair gold, setting it _ablaze_, like a glowing halo.

It's certainly not helping with Charles' predicament, his tenuous grasp on reality.

Leon is perched on the kitchen counter, chewing on a slice of apple and swinging his legs. Collette is measuring a cup of flour with an intense expression, levelling tablespoons meticulously.

Charles can see Henry's plaid pyjama clad bottom sticking out of the pantry as he no doubt roots around for the Belgian chocolate chips.

Seb turns around at that moment and locks eyes with Charles in the hallway.

He smiles affectionate and content and it's _too much_.

(Too much _dream_ or _cruel taunt_.)

There's a gallery of voices inside his head and they're mocking him.

(Look how much you lost.)

(Look how much you lose every morning.)

(Just by daring to wake up again.)

Charles bolts.

Runs out into the garden, barefoot and trailing multicoloured silk.

He stops next to a large lemon tree to take a handful of big gulping breaths.

He's acutely aware of how his hands are shaking. How his whole body is trembling like a lone leaf caught in a rainstorm.

The branches of the tree are heaving under the weight of their golden yellow bounty. The air is sweet and sharp with the scent of citrus.

Charles focuses on that, uses that to ground him to reality.

The scent of lemon on the breeze and the underlying saltiness from the ocean.

The feel of the grass under his bare feet.

The dull ache in his chest as he breathes too quickly. 

Warm arms wrap carefully around his middle, "I've got you, I've got you," a voice rumbles quietly.

Seb holds him until Charles stops shaking. They must stand there for almost an hour.

"_I've got you, I've got you, I've got you..."_

Seb says the words so many times they stop sounding like words.

_(Now)_

Charles can't help wishing Collette was here.

She always seems to know when to drag her _papa _out of his head in a way that only a handful of people have ever known how to.

The other person Charles can usually rely on is unconscious on an operating table.

And Charles is lost inside his own head. Prisoner and warden at the same time.

Charles' own head is the last place he wants to be right now.

Kimi quietly relays to him that Collette is safely in the car and on her way over as they speak.

Charles nods and focusses on holding it together until she gets here.

He can appreciate the fact that Kimi is still talking to him, in calm soothing tones. Like Charles is a small animal vulnerable to being startled by so much as a slightly raised voice or unexpected movement.

Everyone else seems genuinely terrified of him.

Charles ignores them all. His hands are clasped so tightly that his knuckles are white.

_He doesn't think God is listening._

_Or maybe,_

_Maybe he is._

_Maybe he's letting the line ring out. _

_His patience with Charles and his lifetime of demands finally run out. _

It's not a particularly helpful thought.

If God isn't listening then Charles supposes he'll have to take matters into his own hands.

That's how he's always done it anyway.

The problem is,

Is that,

Well,

This might be the one time where Charles' needs God to step in.

The one time where Charles' Herculean force of _will_ may not be enough.

_God returned Seb from the brink of death once already._

_Maybe that's it._

_The cap._

_One miracle per lifetime. _

Henry sits down in the vacant seat next to him and wordlessly offers Charles a steaming mug.

Charles has already opened his mouth to decline until he notices the mug-

It's Seb's old mug.

Some old chipped thing they got for free when Collette had to go to the dentist for braces. There's a big cheesy smiling tooth on it and the name of the orthodontist practice in swirling letters.

He can even smell his favourite peppermint tea in the soft plumes of steam wafting towards the ceiling.

Charles looks up at Henry, Henry just smiles crookedly.

Charles numbly accepts the mug, "... _how_-"

"I had someone pick up some things from the house," Henry explains as he tucks an unruly curl behind an ear,

_God,_

_He looks like Seb._

"I knew you would never drink hospital coffee or tea," Henry smiles a little fondly.

_God,_

_He-_

Charles wraps his fingers around the mug, can feel the heat emanating from it, the way it seeps into his fingers but can't quite make the distance to his frozen heart.

He presses a kiss to Henry's forehead.

Henry accepts it and closes his eyes, long dark lashes fluttering slightly in surprise.

Charles hasn't kissed him on the forehead in years.

(Not since skinned knees and unreciprocated first crushes.)

"He's going to be okay," Charles insists quietly.

Henry wraps his hands around Charles' hands, trapping them between the warmth of his own palms and the steaming mug. 

"Of course, papa," he says diplomatically.

_(Then)_

Collette brings her first boyfriend home two weeks after her seventeenth birthday.

Charles has a feeling Henry has known for a while before that but was keeping his sister's secret. He refused to confirm or deny when Charles confronted him but Charles' eldest has always been a terrible liar.

_Awful_.

Charles could tell. 

The boyfriend in question is sitting next to Collette on their couch. He's wearing a _linen shirt. _

In _Autumn_.

It's unbuttoned to a truly indecent point down his chest and his hair looks uncombed.

Charles thinks he's going to have an aneurism.

Collette is wearing a pale cornflower blue vintage Chanel tweed skirt for Christ's sake.

"He's a photographer," Collette says hopefully, the famed Viper Princess temporarily absent in her starry eyes, "and he's studying philosophy."

Charles' eyes instantly narrow, he knows what that means.

Seb quickly cuts in to ask about his photography and what camera he uses.

Charles is far less gracious once Collette has left for her date.

"He's a _bounder_\- a _vagabond _Seb," Charles hisses, waving his hands around, "our Collette should be dating minor royalty- or at the very least a _Business major_."

Seb is slicing some fresh bread and making noncommittal noises.

Charles waves a ladle around, "or a _surgeon_," he adds heatedly.

Seb has the expression of someone trying extremely hard not to laugh.

Charles glares at him and then freezes, "_oh my god-_"

Ragu sauce drips onto the tiles.

A bright splotch of rich red staining the glossy turquoise tiles.

Seb is grinning like a little _shit._

"I've become my mother," Charles is horrified.

If there was ever a moment for the ground to open up and swallow him up, it would be now.

Fuck_._

_He's become his mother. _

Seb has to prise the ladle out of Charles' grip and guide Charles to the couch to sit down and have a drink of water.

(And later a big glass of red wine.)

Seb laughs for a whole day, keeling over and laughing so hard he's _wheezing_ every time he claps eyes on Charles' stunned expression.

The intense _betrayal _in his eyes_. _

Afterwards, he reluctantly lets Seb kiss his hair, his cheek, _his neck_, in apology for laughing.

At least Collette's next girlfriend is studying economics as well as Greek poetry.

Small mercies.

_(Now)_

Collette bursts through the doors furious and flanked by three frazzled members of Seb's personal security.

She's wearing a charming printed silk dress and she immediately demands a status update from the nearest nurse like a pit-bull.

A lioness.

Strips of cerulean blue silk flutter from the skirt of her dress as she quivers with indignation and worry.

_She must have been getting ready to go out with her friends_, Charles realises tiredly.

Charles nods at Kimi and the other man wordlessly grabs the coat he'd thrown on another chair and drapes it over Collette's bony shoulders.

She doesn't even notice, too busy chewing the poor nurse's ear off.

Some of the terms she's using sound familiar, technical medical terms, like the ones the doctor was using before when he spoke to Charles.

Charles has a feeling that Collette may have been researching heart surgery on the car ride from the Amalfi Coast to Naples. 

_She would._

His Viper Princess.

Studying Politics and International Business and reading peer-reviewed medical reports in the car at midnight as her father lay on an operating table.

Henry goes to join her and ask the poor cornered nurse some of his own questions too. His tone at least seems a little less adversarial.

Charles just stays put. Hands clasped so tight he's starting to lose feeling in his fingers.

If there's anything important they will tell him.

Plus,

He doesn't even think his legs work anymore.

_(Then)_

Henry and Collette are trying to figure out how to use the pizza oven in the garden. 

Having already politely declined any offers of assistance from Seb and Charles.

They're just supervising, armed with glasses of red wine. Watching as their two eldest approach their task like historians uncovering an antiquated relic from an ancient civilisation.

Charles wonders if it's possible to spontaneously combust from sheer contentment. Sentimentality.

He would be happy to volunteer to be the first.

He takes a sip of his wine and his lip curves as Henry finally figures out how to adjust the heavy iron grate.

Collette whoops in victory and they high-five each other.

_Bless_.

"I never asked," Seb says all of a sudden, pulling Charles out of his musings, "but why did you start wearing your old ring?"

Charles stares down at the ring in question.

He's almost forgotten by now. He hasn't worn his bigger ring in ages.

Can't even remember which safe it's in if he's being honest.

"I don't know," he says to fill the silence. To buy himself some time.

It's a lie.

_He knows._

But he doesn't know how to package that feeling that he wants to express into a neat sentence.

That feeling.

That complicated tightening in his chest every time he thinks about the unhinged hysteria of those first few days after Kimi called him with the news. 

"I think I wanted- _needed _to hold onto every piece I had of you, the proof that you were here," his throat is dry, "that even if you were gone, I didn't just imagine it all."

Charles doesn't look away from Henry and Collette. Can't quite make himself look at Seb to see his expression.

"Because I might have," he finally throws Seb a rueful smile, "thought I imagined it all, that is."

A questioning look from Seb.

"It's your fault," Charles explains, tries to effect some weak teasing into his tone, "you loved me too much," a sad smile, "it was exactly the type of thing I would have convinced myself was a figment of my imagination."

Seb stares at him with an unreadable expression, eyes dark.

He doesn't say anything.

They stand there while Henry and Collette burn wood in a small pizza oven in the backyard of a beautiful restored Palazzo that overlooks the main bay of Sorrento.

Seb doesn't ask him about his ring again but later, after dinner, after Charles has finished washing the dishes with Henry-

_With his tiny little wedding ring sitting in a glass dish next to the sink_

-Seb kisses him on the cheeks.

Once on the left.

Once on the right.

Once on his forehead.

And then proceeds to take his hand and press a kiss on Charles' bare ring finger with enough solemn care to make the breath catch in Charles' throat.

A week or two later they're back at home.

The house is quiet, the kids are at school.

They'd taken a long lunch and swung back home to pick up a file they left here before driving back to _la officina_.

That's when Seb brings it up.

In the cool darkness.

They were only ducking in and out to grab the one document, they didn't bother turning on any of the lights.

Charles is flipping through a document folder on the kitchen bench and Seb just asks point-blank.

"Do you ever think about renewing our vows?" the question is innocent enough.

A pause.

Charles slowly puts the document back onto the table and inclines his head.

"Are you sure you want to do this all over again?" he teases, lip curving.

The moment he says it Charles knows his own answer with overwhelming certainty.

"Absolutely," Seb smiles like they're foolish twenty-somethings again.

Charles releases a sigh he didn't know he was holding.

"I have absolutely no regrets, you?" Seb asks, a glint in his eyes, "speak now or forever hold your peace."

It's dark enough that Charles can't completely make out Seb's expression.

He doesn't need to though.

If there was ever a face he would know even in the dark-

Well,

It would be-

Charles smiles.

"No regrets," he agrees, "none."

_(Now)_

They're all tired.

Everyone except for the security stationed around the waiting room and in the hallways, it would seem.

Charles watches as Leon curls his little body up across two chairs, rests his head in Collette's lap to sleep. She unconsciously adjusts her posture to accommodate him and absentmindedly runs her fingers through his matte black hair.

She's squinting as she scrolls on her phone trying to find information on medical consultations and specialists that can be drafted in on late notice.

Henry is on the phone to _la officina _solemnly advising them of how long they may need to lock down the hospital. Ordering that they spare no expense when it came to their father.

Instructing them to do whatever is necessary to ensure no one attack the headquarters tonight.

Charles wants to cry.

Worse,

He wants to _laugh._

He wants to laugh in the hospital waiting room because if Seb were here Charles can just imagine turning to him and saying,

_Darling,_

_Look,_

_Our angels have it all sorted. _

How Seb might wrap his hand around Charles' and squeeze it reassuringly,

_My love,_

_Surely, we can retire now,_

_Move back to Florence and make pasta every night._

_Maybe raise a goat or two. _

_Definitely chickens. _

_I'll get so incredibly fat and bald. _

If Seb were here-

Well,

Charles stops smiling.

If Seb were here?

A lot of things would be different.

_(Then)_

Charles slams the door and wastes no time getting right into his face.

To his credit, Seb doesn't flinch.

"You don't get to do that again, you don't get to disappear on us again," Charles accuses. His voice cracks but he ignores it, "we only just got you back," he tries to reign in the shrill note in his voice but it's a close thing, "we're not _losing you again_."

Seb crosses his arms, "you don't get to wrap me in cotton-"

"Clearly you need it," Charles interrupts and jabs a finger at the little cut on his cheek. It isn't bleeding anymore but it stands out, stark, against Seb's skin like a reminder of Charles' worst nightmares.

The nightmares he would wake up from, only to find out he was living a waking one. 

Seb rolls his eyes, "Kimi let me-"

Charles snarls, "we'll get to _Kimi's role in all of this_ don't you worry."

Kimi raises his hands in the universal sign of, _I don't want to be involved in this_, and promptly ducks out of the room. Shutting the door silently behind him.

Seb growls in frustration, "you don't get to hide me away-"  


"Oh well, you'd know all about that wouldn't you-"

Seb's mouth closes with a loud snap.

"What is it you really want to talk about, Charles," he bites out.

He called Charles _sweetling _over breakfast that very morning. Kissed him in the kitchen with coffee on his breath.

Charles wants to _scream. _

But he wants to keep deluding himself into thinking everything is okay for a little while longer.

He wants it to be _okay _for a little while longer more than he wants to _scream_.

Charles knows how to pick his battles.

_Oh, how the mighty have fallen, _

"It doesn't matter," Charles tries to bleed the emotion out of his voice.

Seb looks at him like he doesn't recognise him. Like an invisible gulf, a valley is opening up between them.

Charles bit his tongue and let the coppery blood from the cut pool inside his stomach just for some more _okay_ and he still didn't get it.

_How fitting. _

Seb stares at him and Charles watches as he distances himself as well.

The gulf, the valley, widens.

Charles wants to _scream_ but he just lets the blood keep filling his insides until it starts flooding his lungs.

He wonders if he'll eventually choke on it. 

"Okay," Seb says blankly, "it doesn't matter."

_(Now)_

"How are you feeling?"

Charles gives Kimi a look, an _are you really asking me that _look.

Kimi shrugs as if to say, _it was worth a try_.

It's quiet. There's no one else around. 

Charles is hiding out in the hallway. Crouched down next to a vending machine.

He had to get out of that waiting room.

Where everyone was staring at him-

With sympathy, fear, _pity_.

"Maybe his luck has finally run out," Charles says quietly.

It's uncomfortable.

The possibility that yes-

This is it.

Unexpected. Unremarkable. Undignified.

Painful and prolonged.

_This is it._

This is how his mighty husband is felled.

"No," Kimi says bluntly, "it can't be." Stubborn.

Charles blinks, "but what if-"

"-It can't be."

He looks up just in time to catch a glimpse of a furious glint in those icy eyes before Kimi sweeps off abruptly.

Charles realises belatedly that now is probably not the time for him to be speaking like this. Like the hourglass has already been flipped over and the grains of sand are gathering around their feet.

Maybe it wasn't appropriate for Charles to be talking like that.

And certainly not to someone else who loved his husband deeply.

_But_, Charles wonders helplessly, _who else can he talk to then_.

Charles watches Kimi disappear down the hallway and wonders if honesty is really a virtue.

That honesty is all good and well until it's your own skin in the game.

(Your heart.)

(Your husband on the cold operating table.)

_(Then)_

"Can we have the room for a few minutes?" Charles asks icily.

He doesn't miss the way Andrea-

Who has weathered both Seb and Charles' commands, and now is faced with-

(With _this_)

(This tumultuous seesaw shared-reign)

-Glances uneasily at Seb, as if for _confirmation_.

Charles growls.

Seb nods and Andrea makes the wise decisions to make his exit. All but sprints from the shared office in _la officina. _

Charles spins around on a pointed heel, "what the fuck?"

"It was a bad decision, I had to say _something_," Seb says evenly but Charles can tell he's holding back.

He doesn't like that.

"_Excuse me?" _

"You can't just expect the D'Angelo's to grin and bear it forever as you all but raze through their entire operation," Seb's voice is steadily growing louder, "eventually they're going to snap and it will be all-out war."

"You don't think we'll win?" Charles sneers.

"If it comes to all-out war?" Seb arches a golden brow, "I don't think_ anyone_ will win, my dove," his voice is sarcastic.

That hurts. 

"We can't just _play nice _forever, my love," Charles spits.

He can be _mean _too.

Charles can be _much meaner_ than Seb.

Seb had to _learn _mean, Charles was born with mean in his veins and fogging up the glass of his lungs.

But Seb knows that Charles _loves him_, knows the exact magnitude of _infinity _with which Charles loves him, and he's not afraid to name that _infinity_.

(To name it after himself.)

That in and of itself is viciously mean too.

"Do you want us to all end up _dead_, Charles?"

That stops Charles, shuts him up immediately.

That Seb has the audacity to use the-

_The 'D' word._

"Do you want power so much that you don't need anything else anymore," a lethal quiet to his voice, "that you don't need us anymore."

Charles shakes his head, "that's not true."

"It doesn't look that way from where I'm standing."

Charles backs up a little, defensive, "I'm not going to change my mind just because you want me to be demure and quiet."

That at least manages to surprise Seb.

"I've never wanted you to be quiet or demure," he says confusion colouring his tone.

Charles scoffs even as something claws at his throat, "I won't go back into the shadows," he's aware desperation is bleeding into his voice, "I won't go back to sitting on the sidelines."

Seb is watching him carefully, "I don't think I could make you even if I wanted to."

There's a thoughtfulness to his tone, all the anger bled dry from his voice. Replaced by an incredulity.

A distance.

(Like he can't understand Charles.)

(Like he doesn't know him anymore,)

Charles wants to scream.

He wants to go back to _yelling_.

So he doesn't have to confront the demons whispering at him from the gallery inside the four walls of his mind.

So he doesn't have to confront his fear-

The fear that-

"Just tell me if you don't want me anymore," Charles blurts out, "now that I'm not sweet or untouched by this."

There's a stunned silence.

"I understand," he lies.

Charles feels the tell-tale burning of tears threatening to spill down his cheeks.

"Just tell me that you don't want me anymore, now that I've tasted real power."

He stares down at his feet. The satin pointed toes of his Manolo Blahniks.

"Now that I have acquired a taste for it, now that I have found something sweeter than _softness_."

Now that he's started, Charles figures he may as well air it all out. 

"I can't go back, even if I wanted to," he blinks, "which I _don't_."

There's still no response and Charles angrily looks up angrily. Ready to demand a response-

Only to find Seb stood in front of him, tilting his chin up with a pointer and thumb.

Expression arch, eyes dark.

"You're an _idiot_, granted, the loveliest one I've ever laid eyes on, but an _idiot_ nonetheless," he declares and Charles opens his mouth to object but Seb ignores him, "I want you more than ever but I don't know if you'll let me," he backs Charles up against the big mahogany desk and parts his legs.

He situates himself in between them.

Charles watches dumbly, not even daring to hope, and wraps his legs unconsciously around Seb's hips.

Tugging him even closer and scrabbling a little to grip the edges of the desk for balance.

"Never doubt that I want you with every breath in my body," Seb mutters as he presses himself against Charles.

Let's Charles feel the tangible proof of his _wanting. _

Charles whimpers a little under his breath.

"Even if you set the world on fire against my wishes, _I will want you_," he promises, "in fury and madness and despair, _I will always want you, Charles_."

_(Now_)

At around three am the nurse's station is sent into a frenzy.

Charles is later informed that there was a complication. Some sort of inadvertent embolism that the doctors can't manage to explain.

For some reason, this is what sets Charles off.

Shatters his brittle composure.

He's shrieking and crying and faintly, in some small still-functioning part of his brain, he's relieved that Leon is asleep in another room.

(That he doesn't have to see his papa descend into madness like this.)

Collette and Henry are watching him with wide eyes, for once, unsure of how to respond.

The only person who dares to approach him is Kimi.

He wraps his strong arms around Charles, bundles him up, and forcibly drags him into the hallway.

Presses him up against the wall and harshly tells him, "you need to breathe, Charles, open your fucking mouth and breathe, then you can yell and shout all you like."

Charles complies and sucks in shuddery breath after shuddery breath.

His lungs hurt.

Charles leans against the wall and sinks to his knees, "I'm not ready to say good-bye to my husband," he whispers, "I'm not fucking _ready_."

Everything _hurts_.

Kimi crouches down, "you're never going to be ready to say good-bye to your husband, I don't think having to do it once already was ever going to prepare you for it."

A wry smile.

"I don't think is something where you can say that _practice helps."_

Charles just places his head in his hands and focuses on breathing.

_In and out._

_In and out._

_In and out. _

Kimi crouches down next to Charles.

A sliding door opens and Henry and Collette materialise in the hall too.

Collette immediately sinks down next to Charles wrinkling her nice silk dress in the process. She's barefoot, her toenails are a dark oxblood.

She kicked off her strappy sandals a few hours ago. Left her python sandals in the corner of the waiting room, next to the water dispenser. 

She sits down on the linoleum floor next to Charles and lets him rest his head on her shoulder and grasps his cold hands in her smaller ones.

"_Breathe_, papa," she pleads quietly with him. She nods to Kimi over his head.

Kimi rises.

"I'm stationing you and Antonio in front of his hospital room," Henry says stonily, "no one goes in or out without your say so."

Kimi nods.

"If they're claiming to be a doctor, they need to prove it," Henry is steadfast.

Charles has never heard his amiable, ever-beaming, eldest son speak like that. Like a general giving orders to his troops.

It would probably be chilling if Charles wasn't already freezing numb. 

Kimi nods, "got it." 

"It's okay papa," Henry turns to reassure Charles, "it's okay, papa."

_(Then)_

They're walking, strolling hand in hand down the Champs Elysees.

Charles has his hands full of shoppers.

_Christian Dior_

_Givenchy _

_Cartier_

_Christian Louboutin _

_Chanel_

  
  


You name it.

"What did you want?"

"For lunch?" Charles asks distractedly as he slides a few bags onto his other arm, freeing his hand to dig around in his handbag for his phone.

He wanted to swing by _Harry Winston_ but they can always go after lunch. 

Seb shrugs, "yeah, I was thinking we could have a simple bistro lunch and then venture out again for some afternoon tea later, the patisserie around the corner looks promising..."

When Charles retrieves his keys with a victorious yelp he looks up-

He looks up just in time to see a family walking in the opposite direction of them.

A mother holding hands with a little boy. A father has a little girl with rosy-cheeks on his shoulders.

They're laughing.

They look like locals. Out on a family walk together. Laughing and walking hand in hand.

Enjoying the sunshine and each other's company.

It stops Charles dead in his tracks. The sudden sharp stabbing in his chest.

The violent and overpowering _yearning._

The mother stops to roll up the little boy's sleeves and presses a kiss to his forehead.

Charles is speaking, interrupting Seb's little tangent on potential lunch options, before he even realises it,

"A family," he whispers, eyes still locked on the strolling family, "I want a family."

A pause.

Charles realises that Seb was probably looking for restaurant recommendations.

Not declarations of paternal inclinations.

Oh well.

"You want children?" Seb asks quietly.

Charles nods tentatively.

A broad smile blooms across Seb's features.

"Do you?" Charles asks even though he thinks he knows the answer.

"Yeah, yeah I do," he ducks his head a little shyly, "yeah I want kids."

_(Now)_

A doctor invites Charles into his office.

He's soft-spoken and he's wearing half-moon spectacles.

_He probably went to a good university,_ Charles thinks faintly.

He probably woke up that morning and ate some breakfast, maybe a slice of toast and a small espresso, and had no idea that he would be treating the most powerful man in Europe in less than twenty four hours.

He patiently tells Charles that there is an operation they can try but there's only a thirty percent chance of success.

He says it gently like he's already sure it won't work and he doesn't want Charles to get his hopes up.

_Thirty percent success rate. _

"I understand this is a difficult-"

Charles hears his croaky voice interrupt him to ask how long they'll have if Seb doesn't have the operation.

_What's the best-case scenario. _

The doctor tries not to wince,

He tells Charles that they can probably keep him on the machine for three to four months.

Charles feels hollow.

Open-heart surgery or plugging his husband to a machine for a few months of-

-Of _who knows what._

Charles knew deep down that he'd never get forever but _a few months _feels particularly cruel.

He almost wants to tug on the doctor's coat sleeve, just like Leon would have only a few years ago, to ask,

_He needs a heart._

_Can he just have mine?_

_Can you just do that?_

_It's all open-heart surgery in the end isn't it?_

"I'll need to think about it," he says quietly.

The doctor nods understanding, he gives Charles an hour before the window for the operation closes.

Charles locks himself in a small supply closet and tries not to have a breakdown.

He knows his decision before he even sank to his knees in a dark closet stuffed full of cleaning supplies.

Perhaps he just needed some time to come to terms with it. To come to terms with the gravity of it before he had to guide his children through it too.

There's a bottle of surface spray directly in his eye-line.

Charles is so tired and emotionally wrung out.

He wonders if he can use the bright blue surface spray to clean up his life. To wipe away all the unfortunate indiscretions.

_Works on all surfaces!_ The label cheerfully proclaims.

Charles wants to start afresh. To go back to square one and back to that Chanel boutique.

That charming stranger with smiling blue eyes. 

Then and again,

_There are some stains that you just can't get out,_ Charles thinks tiredly to himself.

  
  
Plus,

It’s not like he’d do any of it differently.

Charles grips the handle to the door and steels himself.

_It's all open-heart surgery in the end isn't it?_

Once outside of the supply closet he spies Kimi leaning heavily against the window sill. His back is to Charles but his shoulders are shaking.

_Oh, Kimi._

Charles silently approaches him and loops his arm through Kimi's.

Kimi's face is so blank, a deliberate absence of anything, it's unsettling.

Deeply sad. Excruciating.

"He's going to be okay," Kimi says, voice rough but stubborn.

It's Charles' turn to say, "of course, Kimi."

They don't say anything after that.

Charles just presses his cheek to Kimi's shoulder and stares out of the window into the inky black nothingness with him.

They stand there for a while.

_It's all open-heart surgery in the end isn't it?_

_(Then)_

Seb surprises him one afternoon.

Turns up at _la officina _in his cherry-red Ferrari with two weekend-bags packed in the backseat.

Tells Charles with a mischievous little grin that Kimi is watching the kids, that he was thinking they could, _maybe celebrate their anniversary together._

Charles is so intolerably charmed but nonetheless checks what Seb has packed in the weekend bag before he agrees.

Then he makes Seb drive them back home so he can repack his bag.

(Seb's interpretation of a weekend-bag was _dismal_.)

(Two sundresses and five sets of lingerie.)

(Only one pair of shoes.)

(Charles almost laughs.)

By the next morning, they're in Florence.

That same evening they make pasta with the old clunky monster of a pasta maker and sit in the backyard to eat it. Just like old times.

Only this time they sit on cushions and the bottle of wine that accompanied their meal costs ten times as much. 

Seb puts their plates aside at one point.

Holds both of Charles' hands.

"I know we're doing the big party and everything in a few weeks," he explains, "but I thought I could do it here, just you and me, first..."

Charles laughs softly under his breath.

Of course. 

_And now it all makes sense._

The sentimental getaway on the exact weekend of their anniversary.

Oh, Seb.

"I'm listening, my love," he murmurs.

"I mean don't get me wrong," a small grin, "I'm looking forward to the party, but, you're the only one that really matters," Seb shrugs.

Charles is lost for words.

"You're the one I really want to get this right for."

And how could anyone-

How could _Charles_ possibly say no to that?

“So what do you say to a dress rehearsal?” Seb teases lightly.

Charles can tell he’s trying to joke so it doesn’t get weighed down by the gravity.

Just in case Charles still wants an out.

Just in case Charles isn’t as serious as he is-

Which,

_For fuck's sake._

They’ve been married how many years?

If he still thinks Charles isn’t all-in.

Isn’t wholeheartedly invested in this tenterhook waltz of a marriage.

Every part of it. Good and bad. Exquisite and ugly.

This marriage.

This magnificent orchestra on fire.

“No, Seb,” Charles corrects gently.

He thinks it’s high time he made the state of affairs abundantly clear to Seb.

“That party in a few weeks? That’s the encore for this.”

Seb’s eyes do that unfathomably warm crinkly thing.

Three weeks before the official vow renewal ceremony, on a dusty stoop in the garden of a grand old house on the outskirts of Florence,

Seb and Charles renew their vows.

With the moon and stars as their only witnesses.

With olive oil making their lips slick and shiny.

"My husband, my love, I promise you tomorrow, I promise you _my tomorrow," _Seb declares.

Charles pretends to scoff, "darling, I have tasted your tomorrow, I want your _forever_," he smiles ruefully, "you can hold your _forever_ like a rusty anchor, but mine is yours, unlike you, I am unafraid of forever."

"I'm not afraid," Seb says, "I just don't think I'm allowed to promise anyone my _forever_."

A pregnant pause.

"Mmm, that's awfully tragic and romantic," Charles tries to defuse the tense atmosphere.

Seb smiles gratefully, "I have been uncovered, I've been trying to seduce you all night," he waggles his eyebrows.

"I think we're a bit too old to fuck in the garden, darling," Charles murmurs wryly.

Seb's expression is comically aghast, he leans in and lowers his voice, "darling you are _certainly not too old to fuck in a garden_, in fact, there's nothing you're too old for-"

Charles laughs and slaps Seb.

"-In fact, were it not for the damage it would wreak on my back, I would ravish you right here, right-"

"-_Okay,_" Charles laughs, "you've made your point, my love."

Seb grins back at him.

Charles just stares down at his pasta until the pink in his cheeks has mostly faded.

Later, when the milky moon is high in the sky and they're gathering their plates and glasses, Seb quietly says, "I meant it."

Charles looks over curiously.

"If I _could _promise anyone forever, it would be you."

Charles smiles, "I know," he reassures Seb.

_(Now)_

He tells the kids about his decision.

The surgeons are already getting ready to operate as they speak.

Before Charles tells the kids, he asks the security and personnel to clear the waiting room.

He already told Kimi and Kimi can inform the others afterwards.

(Divide and conquer for the heartbroken.)

Charles needs to tell his kids first and they need to hear it from him.

He can already tell Collette is angry they weren't consulted but is biting her tongue because she probably would have made the same decision.

(And because she loves him.)

Henry keeps asking to confirm that it's a thirty percent success rate as if Charles just happened to remember the words wrong. 

_God,_

He's just like Seb. Can't resist challenging unfavourable odds. Can't resist trying to be the exception.

And maybe it's Charles' fault,

He enabled this kind of behaviour,

Because, of course.

Seb was always the exception to Charles' rules.

Every fucking one of them.

_(Then)_

Charles has never been one to sit on the sidelines, marriage certainly won't change that.

There's a small diamond on his ring finger and Charles got married in _a church _but he's is still a _viper_.

A serpent.

If Seb thinks he married anything less, then he is mistaken.

He is mistaken, and Charles will gladly correct any misconceptions.

Seb keeps trying to put him in a jewelry box filled with diamonds and pearls and pretty shiny things which,

Which _is nice_.

But it won't ever turn Charles into the dainty little plastic ballerina that spins in time to the music whenever Seb deigns to lift the lid.

Charles is a _viper._

He loves Seb and Seb loves him, that much he's sure of. But he needs Seb to let him be a viper too.

He wants in on the world that Seb is navigating. The one that is composed almost entirely of dark shadowy corners.

Charles wants to bare his teeth and know what it feels like for his threats to be the opposite of empty.

And Seb _won't let him_.

Wants to _protect him._

Charles doesn't want to be protected, he wants to be a _threat_ and all that entails.

It's the most frustrating thing-

Because,

Charles loves him and Seb loves him, that much he's sure of.

_Square one. _

So here they are, screaming and yelling. Accusations bouncing off of the creamy walls until they run out of things to fling at each other.

Until they tire themselves out.

Until the long echoing silences spell out the elephant in the room.

_I love you but what if that's not enough._

_What if one day I stop loving you?_

_What if _ ** _you _ ** _stop loving me?_

_What will I be left with, what have you left me with? _

"I don't want to be angry at you," Charles eventually says quietly.

Seb regards him warily.

"I don't want us to be angry at each other," he says.

"We are going to get angry at each other, Seb," Charles reminds him, "it's going to happen as long as you keep things from me, as long as you keep _me _from things."

"I know."

"I won't ever love you any less when I'm angry with you, when you make me sad, when you worry me, I still love you," Charles points out.

Charles stares down at his hands, his tiny little rock of a ring, "you have to let me be angry at you, sad about you, and trust that I love you through it all," he says quietly.

"Okay."

His head whips up at how easily Seb agrees.

But Seb has a request of his own.

"Will you trust me, that the decisions I make," a sad smile, "as difficult as they may sound to you, that they're made out of love."

_I suppose I could go on without you._

_If I absolutely had to. _

"That I may make difficult decisions, and they may take me far away from you but I'll always be trying to find my way back to you."

_But I don't want to. _

Charles stares back at him.

The lid of the jewelry box is shutting over his eyes again, plunging him into the darkness with nothing but the shiny trinkets for company again.

Maybe he's not alone inside the box though.

And even if he is,

Maybe Seb is sitting right outside of it. Palms pressed against the painted wood panels.

Trying to find a way back to Charles.

Charles bites his lip, "okay."

_(Now)_

"He's... lucid right now and we're going to put him under soon for the operation," the nurse explains, "would you like to see him before we start?"

Charles knows what that means.

He wasn't lucid before. He may not be lucid for long.

Charles rises.

Three pairs of big eyes turn to him.

Correction.

A room full of eyes turn to him.

_("forever.")_

_("tomorrow.")_

Charles is so tired. He can see the sun from outside the window, behind the fleet of black company cars and his red Ferrari.

He's been awake for a long time but his body feels dead.

Resurrected just to die one more time.

_("forever.")_

_("tomorrow.")_

He doesn't know how he's still standing upright.

He feels like someone has taken a cold metal spoon and scooped out all his insides. Leaving him feeling raw and hollow.

Like the wind that rustles and tears through an empty forest.

He doesn't know if he is the barren forest or the frozen wind though.

Charles nods, "yes, I want to see him."

He can feel his chest cracking open with every step he takes.

_It's all just open heart surgery in the end isn't it?_

Charles unclasps his hands.

His fingers are sore and stiff from how long he's had them clasped together.

_Seb,_

_Maybe I could go one without you._

_If I absolutely had to._

_But I don't want to. _

_(Then)_

The priest looks a little nervous. Charles can't quite blame him.

He's officiating the vow renewal of the most dangerous couple in Italy.

(Nay, _Europe_.)

In their own backyard no less.

Charles can count at least twenty members of security.

Armed, of course. 

He'd probably be sweating too if he was in the priest's position.

As it stands, Charles is not.

He's dressed in Chanel couture, in airy layers of silk and chiffon, and spritzed in Armani's _Si._

One does not sweat in Chanel couture nor in Armani perfume.

Seb is smiling at him just like he did all those years ago in a little church.

When he wore a suit that didn't fit him and his dreams were hazy wisps of smoke that have wafted into the sky and eventually found their place here,

In a sprawling palazzo in Sorrento,

In a sun-drenched garden in full bloom,

With a garden full of family, company, and a handful of amenable politicians dressed in their finery.

There's a scar running down the side of his face, it's faded now, skin just half a shade lighter than the rest of his face. 

Charles has never loved him more.

His heart is an ever-expanding phenomenon. Constantly challenging his threshold for pain and for love.

"Sebastian," Charles starts, "you fool," the breeze rustles his veil.

The air is sweet with the ocean and their garden full of summer blooms.

Seb smiles crookedly.

"Only a _fool_ would refuse to promise _me_ his forever," Charles can hear the titters in the crowd.

_If only they knew the half of it,_ he thinks amusedly to himself.

"...But I suppose I am also a fool for sticking around nonetheless, because, really," a small secret smile, "_my_ forever has always been yours."

Seb is blurry now.

Charles must be crying.

He didn't even realise.

"So now you have two lifetimes of _forever _belonging to you," Charles smiles through the glittering veil of tears, "and I know that the moment you decide to loosen your iron hold on even a tiny fraction of _forever, _it will be for me."

Seb is smiling and his eyes are sparkling too.

Their second wedding and they're still crying.

_Surely that's a good sign, _a small voice in the back of his mind muses.

(They're still here.)

(They're still in love.)

(They're still _here._)

"And that is enough."

_( )_

Seb opens his mouth and, inexplicably, the first thing Charles thinks is that Seb looks so much older than when Charles first met him.

More tired too, _understandably,_ but-

Thankfully,

No less in love.

Seb opens his mouth and declares, "forever may be mine," he smiles, "but my tomorrow always belongs to you."

**Author's Note:**

> i hope the ending made sense- like
> 
> i wanted to keep it ambiguous, it could be a continuation of the earlier flashback OR it's back to the present. you decide :))))


End file.
